


I Got Low

by flight815kitsune



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-08
Updated: 2012-12-08
Packaged: 2017-11-20 14:31:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/586398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flight815kitsune/pseuds/flight815kitsune
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I got low." <br/>Everyone has a low point. 5+1 format</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Got Low

1.  
Steve Rogers leans heavily on his hands. He's tired, and for the first time in a while, he truly wants to sleep.  
But Stark had insisted that they indulge his shawarma idea, and after what he had done no one was going to argue.  
So the half-asleep team ate. He is seated opposite Bruce, and he can't help but to watch.  
He seems happy. He's eating so enthusiastically compared to the others. "I got low." It was hard to picture him with a barrel in his mouth.   
Then again, they would probably say the same about him.  
After Bucky fell, he was in a bad place. But he had other people. He had Peggy. He had the Commandos.  
When he had woken up from the ice, it had taken a few days for him to realize that he had no one.  
The world had changed into something he could barely recognize. The soldiers he had fought alongside were gone.   
Peggy had been killed when someone tried to mug her and she fought back.   
They had never found Bucky's body.  
Shield had given him a sidearm to practice with. He was a soldier and he was Captain America. He had held it in his hands.   
But his mother had taught him one thing if nothing else, to persevere. To go on day after day and help the world even when you don't know what's in it for you anymore.  
He had gone to the range, instead.

2.  
"I got low."  
The phrase kept returning to him, because this was a problem and he fixed problems.  
He kept Bruce close. He needed someone who he could toss ideas at. someone who got it. Someone who saw the world like he did, in some way.  
He knew low. He had done low. And he knew that low was not a good place to be. Low in a lab was a very bad place. A lab gave many opportunities.  
He tried to stay within earshot, eyeshot. He had Jarvis watch when he could not. Just because it hadn't worked before didn't mean a determined scientist couldn't make it stick.  
He had been 17 when his parents had died. Despite the distance, it had hit him hard to lose them both so suddenly. He had been drinking from the time he had been called, through the days that followed, and heavily after the funeral.  
Obie was handling the company. He was good at that. Stark Industries didn't need him.   
He had heard some of the whispers during the funeral, when everyone who had even heard of his father had come to sing his praises and people who knew his mother back before his dad had knocked her up and ruined her life came to remember the Maria they knew.   
He was lazy. He was insane. He was a disappointment. He was a fraud. He wasn't worthy of carrying the great and mighty legacy of Howard Stark.  
If the amount of alcohol in his blood was any indication, he was doing a good job of taking over for the man.  
There were the whispers that he would bring the company to ruin.  
One person's words had struck harder than any of the others, in part because they had no malice. Two older gentlemen, friends or business partners had stood next to each other. One had gestured in his direction. "Who is that?"  
As though he wasn't the spitting image of Howard that he saw in the mirror every morning.  
"That's Anthony. Howard's boy."  
The other man had paused, then. "I didn't know he had a son."  
As much as insults hurt, as much as the doubt burned, not even being known was worse.   
But he didn't deserve to be known. He would never be Howard.  
He engineered a lab accident. With the type of things his father had been known to produce, explosions had happened. So his mistake of a kid got drunk and mixed the wrong things and blew himself up. That kind of stuff happened. Obie would carry on.  
He passed out before he could add the final touches.

3.  
Natasha Romanov watched the footage from the helicarrier. The personnel files needed updated. She would view everyone's interactions.  
"I got low."  
Three simple words complicated her opinion of Banner so much. He was no longer the man who wanted to change the world for the better because he hated what he had done and had a natural urge to be a hero. He had wanted out. This was his second choice.  
She had sat in a cheap hotel in a European country. She had left the blinds open to watch the dawn spread over another grey city.   
She was tired. Tired of this life. Tired down to her very bones.   
She held the gun up to her chin, pointed it upwards. No. That was foolish. There was too much of a chance the bullet wouldn't travel how she wanted it to. She moves it to her temple, instead.   
Women don't usually commit suicide with guns. She was not most women.   
There would be an investigation. She should leave a note.  
She settles on a scrawl of "I couldn't do it anymore."  
Her paperwork said she was a tourist from New York.  
Usually suicide rates drop after a tragedy. She never did fit the status quo.  
She held the gun up again, took a breath.  
There was a knock at the door.  
There was nothing to lose. She laid the gun back down. If someone was to kill her, it would save the cleanup for the local authorities.  
A man stood there. He was dressed in black with a weapon case in one hand. Sunglasses covered his eyes. You could see it in his face that the transmitter in his ear was anything but silent.   
"I'm here to give you the chance of a lifetime." He knew who she was, what she had done, and what she had been planning to do.   
And he smiled.   
She could hear him out, what did she have to lose?

4.  
It's a small post it note on Bruce's file.   
Natasha's neat handwriting "Failed suicide attempt- 'I got low'".  
He had wanted to know as much about his team as the others had when they had gotten into this. Loki had prevented the get-to-know-everyone stage.  
So Banner knew what it was like to want to end it. He could respect that.   
He had done a lot of things he regretted in his life. Maybe a few missions he had gotten more reckless than he had to be. Maybe he didn't take the shots he should have. Maybe he went higher than he needed to when looking for perches.  
He had been low when he had knocked on the Black Widow's door.  
All of the information said that she would kill him. She was a master at hand to hand, he wouldn't last a minute.   
But she had let him speak. She had taken a chance and decided to work for SHIELD.  
In Budapest, there had been something in the water. He had Barney whispering in his ear. Past targets taunted him from the shadows.   
He was up on the roof, bow in hand. The world was shifting around him. He was trying to listen to his orders and get out of there, but the ledge was too tempting.  
The Widow had pulled him back.

5.  
Thor watched his brother in the cell. There were questions he needed to ask.  
Loki had chosen to fall, had resisted the help.  
Had he known that he would live?  
If he did, why did he look so broken?  
Was it more lies?  
"Why?"  
His brother grins. "I believe we've been over this. I was born to be a king, and they were born to be ruled."  
"No, Loki."  
And the flinch may not have been noticeable to someone who hadn't known him for hundreds of years.  
"I could have held forever if it had meant helping you. Why, brother? Why did you not hold on for me?"  
Loki is silent. He was, when he was planning his words carefully.  
"Your mortal allies would be able to explain better than I ever could."

 

+1  
The monitors hadn't been hooked up in days. The IV drip was always the last to go.   
The sheets weren't the best. SHIELD quality was good, but the money had more important places to go. His shoulder ached, but he didn't want the drugs n his system. He wasn't himself when they were there, and he had to be himself for this.   
He had waited his time.   
Fury had tried to keep him here as long as possible, but he could do paperwork. He could handle his agents. He could- you could hear Fury's voice from the hallway. This was it.   
He put on his best face.  
The door opened, and Fury gestured. "Agent, you have some guests."  
He hadn't told them. That much was obvious. Natasha had glared at Fury. Had closed the distance between the door and the bed without so much as a click of heels upon the floor. She had simply searched his face, his eyes, and nodded. She knew that lies were part of the business.  
Stark had smirked, but you could see his mind was racing. He was plotting something against Fury. Something large and likely involving fire and/or public humiliation.  
That might be allowable, because of the look on Captain America's face.   
Steve Rogers was crying. He had his fists balled, but the smile on his face was the thing angels hoped to achieve.  
Clint had looked at him, then to Fury. Looked back.   
He smiled at his archer. What should he say?  
Clint sneered, and a fist flew.  
Fury would be feeling that for a while. The disciplinary action would be added to Clint's already impressive list, but no serious action would be taken. Fury knew about the worth of an agent and extenuating circumstances.  
Thor separated them, and Banner came in behind the god.  
The team had come together, and not just to save the world.  
This was the happiest moment of Phil Coulson's life.


End file.
